Trial ordered for western Pa. man in drug death

BRADENVILLE, Pa. (AP) — A western Pennsylvania man has been ordered to stand trial on charges that he killed a man who allegedly tried to rob him of money and drugs in a mobile home last year.

Twenty-year-old Ronell Moses Jr. of Penn Hills is charged in Indiana County with criminal homicide, kidnapping and terroristic threats in the Dec. 29 death of 24-year-old Matthew Volk of West Wheatfield Township.

The Indiana Gazette says one of two women also charged in the case testified in a preliminary hearing Friday that Moses told her he shot the victim because “he had a gun to my head.”

Defense attorney Komron Jon Maknoon cited that testimony in calling the case self-defense. He asked the judge to dismiss the charges or drop the homicide count to manslaughter.